Let your obsession loose in Danielle Paige’s Heart of Tin

I hope you’re having a great time tonight dressed as your favorite lit-folk! I for one would like to talk about my favorite man-machine hybrid, Oz’s very own Tin Woodman and his adventure throughout Danielle Paige’s prequel novella Heart of Tin.

In Heart of Tin, we meet our favorite man of steel (pun absolutely intended, but hey, it’s Halloween, it wouldn’t surprise me if Tin put on a red cape and drew an T on his silver chest just for fun tonight) as he’s spent what seems like decades as the King of the Winkie country after Dorothy and the Wizard’s departure. He’s been relatively happy, the Winkies aren’t troublesome people and they seem to get along with everyone despite their oddness, but he’s always felt as something has been missing. You see, after Dorothy won him a heart, Tin fell head over heels for Dorothy and has thought about her with every heartbeat of his plush heart.

After Dorothy’s arrival, she and Glinda the “good” Witch of the North, tell Tin, the Scarecrow and the Lion a tale about how Queen Ozma was abusing her power and how Dorothy stopped her and is now a temporary ruler of Oz until a suitable replacement is found, and they assign each of them a series of tasks within Dorothy’s government. Tin is appointed as head of security so he decides to form an army as his gift to Dorothy.

Of course he’d be ecstatic about her return, despite how long it’s been, he’s never found someone to love in his kingdom, what he didn’t count on, was the rage and jealousy that would suddenly grow within himself because of his love for her, and her sudden rise to power.

Tin isn’t the friendly character that wanted nothing more than a heart anymore. This is the Tin Woodman that you would find if there was a horror movie adaptation from L. Frank Baum’s classic. He’ll do anything for love, to win her heart, even harm the innocent and he’ll justify it saying he did it out of love. In a way, his devotion is understandable, he’s very gullible when it comes to Dorothy, he’ll choose to believe she loves him even when she’ll treat him like a piece of garbage, and that’s what people usually do when they’re in love, but that doesn’t mean that he should act the way he does. Either way, with Tin’s story, Paige has shown once again what a master she is at morphing a classic “happily ever after tale” into a nightmare that not even Michael Myers himself would like to dream about.

With the most horrific and spooktacular of the Dorothy Must Die Novellas to the date, the HalloWicked series has come to an end! Remember to stay tuned on November 10th, when her next novella, The Straw King, will be released and to catch up with all the Dorothy goodness before Yellow Brick War hits shelves next spring. Thank you so much for reading and have a great time!

Published by Mónica Giulianna

Literary Journalist originally from Vega Alta, PR. Currently Residing in Syracuse, NY. Book addict, Broadway obsessed, thinker, dreamer and willing to work hard to achieve everything I set my mind to do.
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